VERSACE GOT PARIS haute couture shows off to a hyper-sexy start with a procession of powerful femme fatales as the big gun designers hit the catwalk Monday.

Donatella Versace presented a series of revealing strappy dresses and short sporty Formula One-influenced combinations that dared women to get into the fast lane.

“I think women can be strong and capable of achieving their dreams while being beautiful and elegant,” the Italian designer said.

“It is a collection dedicated to all the women who follow their own path.”

To prove her point, Versace used a number of older models, albeit with perfect gym-hewn bodies.

The Italian creator, who took over the reins of the high-glamour fashion house from her late brother Gianni, also created an eye-catching line of superhero inspired pieces which seemed to channel Spiderman and the fin-de-siecle decadence of artist Aubrey Beardsley’s drawings.

Her models powered down the catwalk late Sunday to a rap of “my body, my soul”, the defiant message being that I will wear what I want to make me feel good and in control.

The emphasis was on legs with short embroidered dresses and long ball robes cut away at the front to show off high-heeled pins.

This take-no-prisoners feminist sexiness came into its own in power suits and gowns with cut away sections tied together with stringy not-quite-bondage cords.

Christian Dior, which has been leaderless since the shock departure of artistic director Raf Simons in October, also pulled out all the stops to impress Monday, building a palace of mirrors in the garden of Paris’ Rodin museum.

While there was much to admire in its riffing on the classic fresh and feminine Dior look, with gorgeous wispy lace and delicate off-the-shoulder dresses with clusters of crystal embroidery, it was far from the unbridled fantasy of John Galliano’s time at the helm.

Dior itself appeared to admit that its wild days were over, claiming its clients now prefer “to dress freely and without fuss” in what it called “couture’s new realism”.

Boss Sidney Toledano said afterwards he was in no hurry to find a replacement for Simons, whose minimalist touch lingered on in the dreamy spring-summer range that many critics predicted would sell well. “It’s not like presidential elections where they are deadlines,” he said.

The studio team, which turned out the show in Simons’ absence, was immensely talented, he insisted.

“We are doing well. I am proud of the spirit that exists in this house. It’s like a great orchestra with a lot of virtuosos.”

Schiaparelli had earlier pulled off perhaps the day’s most playful and unexpected show.

Designer Bertrand Guyon mixed food, fruit and kitchen prints with a large pinch of the Italian artist Piero Fornasetti’s surrealism to produce a collection that was good enough to eat. Floor length sheath, empire line and fairytale dresses, often with ingenious tongue-in-cheek culinary detailing, alternated with knee-length skirts, pinafore dresses and jackets decorated with historic horticultural motifs.

Languid models strutting along a grass-covered catwalk in Paris on Tuesday showed off Chanel’s ecologically-inspired haute couture collection that avoided most of the red carpet flash.

Chanel – the fashion house that is perhaps the most synonymous with Paris’s reputation for glamour – sent subtle, classic clothes across a runway outfitted with pools of water and wooden steps.

Dominating the stage was a vast wooden structure that would not reveal its secrets until show’s end.

The clothing – think “Mad Men” meets “The Great Gatsby” – seemed to reach back to a less flashy time in fashion when simple shapes, high-end fabric and understated colours ruled.

“It’s not really bling-bling red carpet,” said designer Karl Lagerfeld as he greeted fans and well-wishers in the oasis of grass, water and wood inside a glass-roofed exhibition hall just off the Champs-Elysees.

Just six weeks after Paris hosted a historic UN climate conference where 195 nations inked a deal to tackle global warming, ecological themes were at the fore, with wood beads, wild cotton and paper featuring in this spring-summer collection.

“We’re in fashion and at the moment ecology is part of the expression of our time, what fashion is supposed to be,” Lagerfeld said.

“That is a kind of, how could I say, high-fashion ecology. It means that all can be used on a level where nobody expects it,” said the German designer who lives in Paris.

The show was not without star power, with British actress and model Cara Delevingne taking a front row seat on the wooden benches.

The “Suicide Squad” cast member, wearing earrings bearing Chanel’s iconic interlocked “C” logo, posed for pictures with Lagerfeld and actress Diane Kruger after the show. Clad in ankle-length skirts, many models wore variants of the cropped coat Chanel has made a fashion standard.

There were also shimmering beaded numbers straight out of the roaring 1920s, some even topped with sheer capes.

Others boasted darker hues of black, deep blue or brown, though plenty of white, gold and even touches of red shined through.

Lagerfeld’s inspirations were wide-ranging, with the models’ long hair rolled up into a heart-shaped, low hanging bun, and Egyptian-looking thin black lines traced around their eyes.

Asked to explain, he whipped out his phone and showed a photo of a Picasso sculpture that bore a striking resemblance to the models’ makeup and hair styles.

“It’s for the eyes and the hair… This was the inspiration,” he said.

And the box?

At the end of the show, the slatted wooden panels covering the massive wooden box at centre-stage lifted to reveal a sort of doll house containing the models, drawing applause from the crowd.

Lagerfeld admitted to the collision of influences in the show, describing the wooden structure as “Japanese and not Japanese.”

“I have never seen a house like this in Japan,” he said, expressing regret that he could never have one just like it at home.

“I love the idea of wood, I would love to have this house in my garden, but in France you’re not allowed. You’d never get it,” he said.

BIG FLAPPY GREATCOATS, baggy trousers and voodoo charms… that is what fashionable men will be wearing next autumn and winter if the Paris catwalks are anything to go by.

As men’s fashion week wound up Sunday in the French capital, some clear trends were emerging for the months ahead, not least that black is back with a vengeance.

From Dior to Givenchy and Yamamoto and Rynshu, it was everywhere in velvet, leather and wool, often combined with red check, the style touch of the season.

But the trend that dwarves all others is for big and baggy. Small families could settle down for the night inside many of the overcoats that have come flapping down the runways this week.

Raf Simons went hyper-supersized with enormous puffa jackets, Off-White’s coats were so long they were almost adult sleep suits and Rick Owens went and created an actual sleeping bag coat, all riffing on the idea that the modern male needed comforting and somewhere to hide.

Watch out too for overlong sleeves that reach almost to the fingernails and rich, silky purples that appeared most memorably in Dries Van Noten’s gorgeous macks and peacock and serpent pattern coats.

Pink – which in the 19th century was seen as the most masculine of colours before it was lost to bubblegum girliness – has made a tentative comeback too.

It adorned the collars of Givenchy’s coolest jackets, Julien David used it for his most cuddly coats, and it was everywhere in Pigalle’s panorama of pastels.

Hermes tried to take a little of the taboo away by making theirs almost raspberry, while Officine Generale hid their pinks behind blacks and greys.

Another long-time style no-no, the lumberjack jacket, may also be about to be brought in from the cold, meekly making an entrance in Valentino and getting a glamorous makeover by Dior.

But for sheer aplomb, it was hard to beat the dramatic return of braid and breeches.

Agnes B went for less of a testosteroned look, dressing three of her models like 18th-century bourgeois gentlemen in blue and purple velvet, complete with tricorn hats.

But extra large and extra baggy dominated. Even the oldest of the Paris houses still showing, Lanvin, wrapped itself in flappy greatcoats Sunday in the first collection under the sole control of Lucas Ossendrijver after the shock departure of artistic director Alber Elbaz in October.

Rather than make a flashy splash, Ossendrijver – who had been at the label for a decade – went for detail under the watchful eye of the brand’s Taiwanese owner Shaw-Law Wang.

Elbaz sportingly posted a supportive Instagram message saying, “Good luck with your show today Lucas.”

And Ossendrijver did succeed in making the show in a huge hangar on the outskirts of Paris strangely intimate, bringing buyers and press right up close to his creations on the narrow catwalk.

“I wanted people almost to touch the clothes and then be touched by them,” he explained.

“There is a softness and a sensuality about the collection,” he said of his loose cut suits and highly worked coats and shirts that flirted with grunge.

British designer Paul Smith was having none of the new giganticism, however, sticking by his tried and trusted tailored line.

His Sunday show revisited some his classic designs with strong echoes of the 1960s with Crombie coats, single vertical Mod-inspired stripes and Saturday night suits with subtle flower details.

His show began to the chimes of Big Ben and the reggae track “My England Story” before embarking on a musical history of Britain over the last 50 years that ended with the late David Bowie’s “Oh You Pretty Things”.

The clothes, however, drew their inspirations largely from the 1960s and 1970s, with combinations of rich clarets, greens, purples and mothball blues.

“I love the playfulness of this collection,” he said. “We are on a bit of a high at the moment.”

Paris’s haute couture week started late Sunday with Versace although |the shows only began in earnest Monday with Christian Dior and Schiaparelli.

Haute couture exists only in Paris and is sustained by a small number of the world’s richest women.

ORNPRAPHAN SUTTINORASETH, director of Thai ready-to-wear brand Vicks, recently celebrated the huge success of her minimal style of clothing by turning trendy art space The Jam Factory into a hippie hangout and hosting a fashion show and party on the theme “Dream Field” to mark Vicks’ first birthday.

Six leading photographs joined Ornpraphan and created images that reflected how art and fashion are intertwined while indie musicians Yellow Fang, Noth Panayangkul, Sqweez Animal and Bangkok Paradise put on a concert that had everyone up and dancing.

The fashion show was attended by a number of celebrities and fans of the designer, among them Pimpisa Jirathiwat, Duangrit Bunnag, Disaya Korakochmas, Panu Ingkawat, Suchar Manaying, Pokchat Tiamchai, Sara Legge, Kamolned Ruangsri and Irada Siriwut, many of them dressed in her outfits.

Ornpraphan told XP that in 2016, she will focus on laid-back lifestyle trends and emphasise her commitment to slow fashion, which is friendlier to the environment.

The new collection, Dream Field, brought graceful hippie styles to the catwalk, mixing them with modern lines that matched the lifestyles of today’s young people. Cotton, silk and linen were the fabrics of choice enhanced by clean cut silhouettes and neat embroidery in Vick’s signature dark colours, although somebrighter colours were used in a nod to summer.

The concept of slow fashion from Vick’s point of view is a design that’s easy to wear and suited to any body shape. The fabrics, she pointed out, are comfortable, suited to everyday wear and can be mixed and matched at will.

The brand also showed how fashion enhances art through works by six photographers

Naruebet Wadvaree’s work, depicting a holiday journey, was inspired by the concept of isolation reflected in Alex Katz’s artwork.

Sukhum Nakpradit, in collaboration with Vicks, created “1,001 Nights and 1,000 Kilobyte” to guide viewers as they crossed the boundary between fact and deception to join another person’s experience.

Visual designer Supachai Petchree’s “The Summer Wind”, inspired by Frank Sinatra’s song of the same name, showcased the beauty of leaves and flowers while Sirima Chaipreechawat’s black-and-white photo, “A White Ribbon”, offered illustrations of houses and buildings in the style of a fashion photo shoot.

Professional barista Eakamon Theepatiganont reflected on the simple way of life in “Out of Ordinary” while “Natural Habitat of the Fangs”, a work created by band Yellow Fang, dwelt on the warmth and gentleness of |friendship.